


Illuminated

by Aeshna



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon, Gen, Jossed
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-02-09
Updated: 2012-02-09
Packaged: 2017-10-30 20:59:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,141
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/336018
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aeshna/pseuds/Aeshna
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>Life was, after all, for living, no matter what had been lost along the way.</i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	Illuminated

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the [Rose Tyler Gen Ficathon](http://community.livejournal.com/rose_lives/8548.html) on the **rose_lives** LJ community back in 2006. **bimo** requested:
> 
> * Pete  
>  * Torchwood  
>  * _The Skaters_ by John Gould Fletcher: "the brushing together of thin wing-tips of silver" as mood setter/inspiration

> 
> They did not want:
> 
> * Happy fluff * Helpless, angsty Rose who hasn't learned how to move on.

> 
> I've written a lot of stuff over the years that has later been trampled into the dirt by canon, but somehow this is the only one that I really find myself resenting!
> 
> Thanks as always to [Mimarie](http://archiveofourown.org/users/mimarie/pseuds/mimarie) for sterling beta work – any remaining weirdnesses are all mine.

There was a soft, omnipresent throb that underlay every other sensation, pulsing through her bones like an echo of the womb. Standing in the observation pod, her hands resting on the railing, Rose Tyler could feel it against her palms, the soles of her boot-clad feet, a whisper of sensation like the heartbeat of the improbable aircraft surrounding her. Far below her vantage point, the dark waters of the North Sea slid by, wind-tossed wave caps occasionally catching the colours of the dawn that stained the horizon with pastel light and illuminated the curved expanse of the gas envelope overhead. It was beautiful, elegantly serene... but it wasn't her world, not really, not yet.

A part of her wasn't sure it ever would be.

Rose closed her eyes, losing herself for a few moments in the quiet pulse of the zeppelin's engines, in the fragile peace of the new morning. It wouldn't be long before they sighted land, and of all the places where –

"Norway again," came a familiar voice from behind her. "They're gonna get sick of the sight of us at this rate."

Rose opened her eyes and smiled wanly at Mickey as he took his place beside her at the railing. "Least we get to fly this time," she said, turning her gaze back towards the eastern horizon.

"If you can call it flying." He nudged her with his elbow. "Be faster by plane, right?"

"Oh, definitely." Rose couldn't quite help her smile at this familiar routine. "What sort of a universe is it, that doesn't have EasyJet?"

"Thought Jackie was gonna have a fit when she found out the cheap flights to Spain were off." Mickey chuckled softly, flexing his fingers against the polished wood of the railing. "I like it like this, though, with the zepps. You get to watch the world go by. You get time to _think_."

"Yeah, you do at that." Rose watched the sea roll past beneath her. When she had first found herself in this other world, warped mirror of her own, she had thought little of the zeppelins, hadn't thought to wonder _why_ they filled the skies instead of jets and helicopters. They were just local colour, just something else to be left behind in the Doctor's mad and endless dash through space and time. It was only after she had found herself stranded that she discovered that the differences between the worlds were more than merely cosmetic, that the very laws of physics were subtly _other_ – there were no winged aircraft large enough to carry even a child, no flighted birds bigger than seagulls. To cross the Atlantic took a week, Australia was a month away, and even the Torchwood Institute's Arctic Research Base required a journey of several days. "All the time in the world...."

Mickey looked at her sharply. "Rose? You okay? I mean, the last time we were –"

Rose shook her head, dismissing his concerns. "I'm fine. Really. I'm past that, remember?" She reached up, hooking a thin gold chain out from the collar of her sweater and dangling a small conical pendant, twin to his own, at him. "Not a member of the Limpet Club any more. It's just...." She paused, then sighed. "I don't know. It's _different_. Some days I feel it more than others."

"Like what you were doing before wasn't _different_?" Mickey snorted. "You need to get out more, Rose. Get yourself on a field team – Bear'd take you in a heartbeat after everything you've done, you know that. See more of the world than just London and the inside of the Tower. Do some _proper_ exploring."

"I'm here, aren't I?"

"Only 'cause Pete requested you, and Yvonne and Raj told you you were going, like it or not," he reminded her, then grinned. "Come on, breakfast's ready and Bear wants to start finalising the calibrations on the new equipment as soon as we're done."

"Right." The first rays of the sun caught the silvery blades of the zeppelin's fore-engines to send a brilliant blaze of light lancing through the pod. Rose smiled, suddenly heartened by the sight, and felt her melancholy mood lift a little. "So, come on then – what are we waiting for?"

~# # # # #~

There were mountains beyond the tall viewing windows of the workshop level, hard-edged grey and green and snow-capped white that almost vanished into the high, pale cloud-cover of the sky. Rose barely noticed the unfolding landscape, her attention focused on the equipment before her, her fingers moving with quick precision as she tuned the sensor array according to the numbers scrolling across her laptop's screen. It still startled her slightly that she could do this, had a talent for it, even – when it came to things electronic or mechanical she had always been content to play the under-educated shopgirl who looked on while the men did the work.

She hadn't been given that option at Torchwood. For all her early reticence, it was one of the things she was most grateful to the Institute for.

The scrolling display slowed, stopped, flashed twice, and Rose leaned back in her chair, working the kinks out of her spine as the indicator lights on the grey sensor-housing settled into a steady green line. Lifting it carefully, she set the array back into its padded cradle and returned it to its place in the racking that lined the inner wall. There were ten units to be taken to the research station, state of the art multi-function climatic dataloggers to be distributed at differing latitudes in an effort to understand why, even after the closing of the Void, the world was still warming far faster than it should. The units, devised by the Institute's research team, were the first project that Rose had really been involved in to any major degree, and each needed to be fine-tuned and calibrated before being put to use. In two days she had finished seven of them and was confident that she would have the eighth done before dinner.

Rose was just about to lift the next array from the rack when a head poked around the doorway. "Knock knock – not disturbing anything vital, am I?"

"Nah, just finished one." She grinned. "I could do with a break."

"Just as well I brought this, then, isn't it?" Pete Tyler handed her a steaming mug – one of the over-sized red ones bearing the Institute's logo in black – and Rose wrapped her hands around it gratefully. "Thought you might like a cuppa – you've been down here for hours."

"Well, you know – work to do...." She took a sip of hot, sweet tea and smiled against the ceramic glaze. "Mmm, thanks."

Pete moved to sit on the edge of her worktable, his own mug in hand. He glanced down at her laptop, then turned back towards her. "How's it all going?"

"Only got another three to go." She made her way back to her chair, settling carefully so as not to spill her tea. "You can tell Raj they'll be done well before we get there. We've got, what? Another two days?"

"So long as the weather holds. Polachek says there's a 30% chance of blizzards around Lenvik – we'll have to set down if we hit those, wait them out." He took a mouthful of tea, his gaze on the mountains that formed the horizon, then said, "Are you all right, Rose?"

"Course I am. Why wouldn't I be?"

"Well, the last time we were in Norway –"

"Oh, not you an' all!" Rose rolled her eyes and set her mug down a little too hard, sloshing brown liquid onto the desk. "I had this from Mickey yesterday! That was all over a year ago now – I'm fine. I'm over it. At the time it was... I was...." She shook her head. "I'm here now. This is my home."

"Is it?" Before she could respond, Pete suddenly chuckled. "Look, don't blame me – it's your mum who's fretting about you being here. You think she'd have her hands full, what with little Lizzie teething right now – and am I glad to have a few hundred miles between me and _that_ , let me tell you – but you know what she's like...."

"Yeah, and we wouldn't have her any other way." Rose smiled and lifted her mug again, thinking of her mother and her little sister, of the family she had never thought she'd have. "Calling you twice a day to check up on me, is she?"

"Well, twice so far today, but I figure she's got time for a couple more before bed. Just be grateful that _your_ mobile doesn't work in the mountains."

Rose laughed and relaxed back into her chair. She had her mother and her little sister, but somewhere in the last year she had stopped thinking of Pete as her father. Oh, genetically he was... but he hadn't raised her, hadn't known her, hadn't bonded with her in the way that he had with little Elizabeth. Rose wasn't certain when she had finally accepted that, when she had started to see him as friend and as mentor rather than as idealised parent, but it felt _right_ to her and things had become easier between them once she had stopped calling him 'Dad'. "Do you think you'll get what you need? From this trip, I mean?"

Pete's expression sobered. "I have to. The government purse strings are getting tighter by the day – the Institute needs to prove that it can make a difference where the climate is concerned. Other than, you know, punching holes in the universe and making it worse."

"But you had to do that!"

"And the President knows it, but she has advisors clamouring at her from all sides." He shook his head, took a sip of his tea. "I need to see things with my own eyes, report back on my own experiences, not just repeat what I've been told. President Jones is a reasonable woman, I like her, but –"

Rose closed her eyes. "But a lot of people see Torchwood as an easy target. Because of what the Cybermen did."

"They know that we weren't the first to open the Void, but they can't see why we went after them. They were gone from _here_ after all." Pete shrugged. "And those people can think of far better things to do with the funding we're asking for."

"But we're the only ones who are likely to make a difference."

"And I know that, and you know that, and the whole bloody Institute knows that. I just have to convince the President about it."

Rose gave a soft laugh. "Doesn't seem to matter what universe we're in – we're still trying to save the world...."

"I thought that was your speciality? Saving the world?" Pete smiled over the rim of his mug. "I mean, you saved yours."

"I...." She trailed off, saw the sudden concern in his eyes, and shook her head. "I had help. I mean, if it weren't for you and Mickey and the others –"

"Speaking of Mickey and the others," Pete interrupted, easing himself off of the workbench, "they've called a break upstairs. I said I'd try to lure you back up."

"By bringing me tea down here?"

"I wanted to see how you were doing – got to have something to report back to your mother, after all." He glanced at the sensor rack on the wall. "And back to Raj, for that matter. You're doing a good job – he'll be pleased to know his faith in you was justified."

Rose bit her lip, feeling her cheeks colour. "Raj just doesn't like flying, that's why he sent me."

Pete raised an eyebrow, clearly not believing a word of it. "So, are you going to come up, be sociable?"

She considered it for a moment... then shook her head. "Nah, I want to push on down here. Thanks, though."

"Rose...."

"Pete, I'm fine. Really." She smiled at him. "Thanks for the tea. Tell them I'll be up later."

"If you're sure...."

Rose let her smile fade as his footsteps sounded on the stairs, leaning back in her chair and closing her eyes. "So here I am, saving the world, yet again," she murmured. "One world or another...."

It was different this time, of course – this wasn't random arrival, high adventure and then onto the next crisis without pause for breath. This was the slow march of years, the consideration of consequences, a sense of _responsibility_ that she simply hadn't known before. In the past fifteen months, she had thrown herself into her work as if trying to prove something to herself, had barely seen the outside of the Tower's research levels, and she had felt herself starting to _fit_....

And now she was outside her comfortable cocoon of tame peculiarity, surrounded by the mechanical heartbeat of the zeppelin and made to face the otherness of the world she had found herself in. And there was something both frightening and empowering in the realisation that this was _it_ , this was all there ever would be, that whatever happened here could not be run from, could only be dealt with. There had been a time when her life had been all black and white, stark and simple, not shaded with the muddy greys of finance and politics and _reality_. She didn't regret the choice that had been made for her, not any more, and yet –

Rose opened her eyes, gazing out at the mountains in all their silent, granite splendour, so different to the familiar concrete cliffs of London. She'd come a long way.

She just didn't know if she'd come far enough.

~# # # # #~

The snowfield stretched out before her, smooth and pristine in the moonlight, the only movement the shimmering drift of wind-blown white that occasionally swirled and danced beneath the zeppelin's long shadow. Rose stood in the observation pod once more, feeling the slightest edge of the chill outside against her cheeks, against her fingers where they rested against the rail, so close to the reinforced curve of the glassy hull. They had gained height to cross the next jagged spur of mountains and she caught her lower lip between her teeth as the landscape unfolded around her, soft and sharp and shining in its elegantly severe beauty.

Snow and stars and shadows.... Rose smiled and stroked her hands along the rail. Even after everything she had seen, the Earth could still more than hold its own.

She had finished the last of the sensor arrays the day before, had spent her time since working with the others on checking and double-checking the rest of the equipment and the supplies they were delivering. The research base was isolated and relied on the thrice-yearly zeppelins to bring fresh food, basic essentials – Jake had pointed out with _entirely_ too much glee that you never realised quite how important toilet paper was until you didn't have any – and much-needed company. There would be an exchange of personnel when they finally reached their goal, just hours away now, and then two weeks of solid work before the long return journey.

After everything that had been done and all that there was still to do, she couldn't feel guilty about snatching a few moments for herself. How could she, when there was all _this_ to see? She would join the others soon enough, when the great airship descended into the shadows of the granite spires. For now she was content to simply empty her mind and watch the world, the only sounds the hollow beating of the wind against the envelope and the quiet pulse of the engines. The silvery blades of the propellers caught the moonlight, reflecting it against the pod's transparent shell like a rain of liquid metal. Beautiful, so _beautiful_....

There was a flicker at the edge of her vision, something shifting subtly green, out of place in this monochrome moment, and Rose turned her head –

– and felt her gasp catch in her chest as the world around her dissolved into a brilliant blaze of colour, emerald and crimson and blue; into shimmering, shifting curtains of light shot through with dancing rays and swirls that swallowed the stars. There was no rhythm to it, no apparent purpose, nothing but pure, heart-stopping beauty surrounding her and filling her with such utter _wonder_ that she wanted to cry from the sheer joy of it. She pressed her palms flat against the chill glass before her, trying to drink it all in, to hold it to her forever as the aurora painted the snow with its colours.

It was several minutes before she realised that her hands were almost painfully cold. And it was only when she rubbed them together to get the circulation flowing once more that she realised that, even in the face of such glory, she hadn't thought to reach for another's grasp.

And that was the instant in which she finally _knew_ that she had reached her journey's end.

"Nordlys," came a quiet female voice from the rear of the pod.

Rose smiled and wiped at her eyes, feeling an inner peace she hadn't known she was capable of. "Northern lights."

"I've not seen a display this good in a while." Footsteps crossed the deck towards her. "You're lucky."

"Guess I am, at that." Rose chuckled and looked down at the other woman. Ursula Blake – Bear – was tiny, her delicate-looking frame and wide, dark eyes belying the fierce personality and indomitable will within. She could easily pass as Rose's peer, although Rose knew that the other woman was in fact more of an age with her mother, the Institute's senior field operative and a force to be reckoned with. "I've never seen anything like it before."

"No?" Bear watched her face assessingly. "I would have thought that –"

"Nothing like this. Nothing like...." Rose turned her gaze back to the shifting lights and wondered if she should feel something, _anything_ other than joy in this moment. But she had spent her grief a year before and numb acceptance had quietly transformed itself into something new, something vital. Something that might just let her make a difference to _this_ world. There had been a time when her life had been all black and white, stark and simple, but now she knew that shades of muddy grey were not the only other option.

No, she was going to live _her_ life in colour, not as shopgirl or as sidekick but as herself, whole and complete, the sum total of her experience. Life was, after all, for living, no matter what had been lost along the way.

He had taught her that much, at least.

"Bear?" Rose took a deep breath and met the older woman's eyes. "I want to test out for a field team."

_Thank you, Doctor. And goodbye._


End file.
